Iranian authorities arrest four more journalists

New York, October 18, 2011--Iranianauthorities arrested four
journalists who work for reformist newspapers and are expected to charge them
with antistate crimes, according to news reports.

Mehdi
Afsharnik, Ali Akrami, Mohamed Heydari, and Mohsen Hakim were arrested and
taken from their homes on October 5, news
reports said.
An Iranian journalist told CPJ that the four arrested men were
rumored to be in Evin Prison, but CPJ was unable to confirm the report. None of
the journalists have had access to lawyers or been officially charged, though their
families were told that they were being charged with antistate crimes, news
reports said.

"Tehran routinely detains any
journalists who dare to contradict the government line in their reporting," said
Mohamed Abdel Dayem, CPJ's Middle
East and North Africa program coordinator.
"What these journalists have done is not a crime. We call for their immediate
release along with that of the dozens of other journalists languishing in
Iranian jails."

Afsharnik
is a veteran business journalist who writes
about the oil and energy sectors for the reformist daily Etemad. In an
interview with Rooz Online, Afsharnik's wife said that at the time of his
arrest, authorities searched their home and took several of his personal belongings,
including cell phones, computer hard drives, and CDs. She said authorities told
her he will be charged with "acting against national security" and "propagating
against the regime."

Akrami is a freelance journalist for
reformist publications and websites and is also the editor of the sociocultural
blog Sheydagooyi. In an interview with
the International Campaign for Human Rights in Iran, Akrami's wife said that he has
made only one phone call to her since he was arrested and that he did not say
where he was being held. She also said that five officers arrested him from
their home, taking with them a laptop, a computer hard drive, a satellite
receiver, several CDs, and other personal items.

Heydari is a political journalist
who has written for now-banned reformist newspapers. Heydari's wife told Rooz
Online that her husband will be charged with "acting against national
security" and "propagating against the regime." Authorities also searched and
confiscated personal belongings from his home, according to an Iranian
journalist.

Hakimi wrote for a number of reformist newspapers including
the now-banned reformist daily Sharq. While he was being arrested at his
home, authorities also took some of his personal belongings, according to reformist news websites. Hakimi
had previously been arrested in 2009 in the post-election wave of arrests that
stemmed from protests that erupted after the declaration of Mahmoud
Ahmadinejad's presidential victory, the same sources reported.

In recent months, Tehran
has maintained a steady stream
of arrests, imprisonments, politicized convictions of journalists, and bans on
reformist publications in a concerted effort to stifle critical journalism. Most
recently, authorities arrested six independent filmmakers on vague accusations
that they had engaged in a foreign conspiracy related to a critical documentary
about Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei that aired on the BBC's Persian
Service.

Since 2009, Iran's
regime has maintained a revolving-door policy for imprisoning journalists and
have held anywhere between 30 and 50 journalists at any given time. The country
is among the top jailors of journalists worldwide.